


FIC: in their element (SPN, Sam/Dean, PG-13)

by electricalgwen



Series: Elementals [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-11
Updated: 2014-07-11
Packaged: 2018-02-08 08:33:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1934085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electricalgwen/pseuds/electricalgwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>So, after SPN 5.05, Erin said: <i>Sam in scrubs? SO GORGEOUS. How about boys as undercover doctors who have to make out in their scrubs so people don't find out they're not real doctors? IT COULD HAPPEN.</i> And I thought, yes. Yes, it could. And I set out to write her a quick 300 word snippet of that, and then there was scene-setting and kidneys and I don’t even know. Here, Erin, have ~2400 words of hospital blither. ♥ Thanks to <span class="ljuser i-ljuser i-ljuser-type-P"></span><a class="i-ljuser-profile" href="http://affabletoaster.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://affabletoaster.livejournal.com/"></a><b>affabletoaster</b>  for a super-quick beta.</p>
    </blockquote>





	FIC: in their element (SPN, Sam/Dean, PG-13)

**Author's Note:**

> So, after SPN 5.05, Erin said: _Sam in scrubs? SO GORGEOUS. How about boys as undercover doctors who have to make out in their scrubs so people don't find out they're not real doctors? IT COULD HAPPEN._ And I thought, yes. Yes, it could. And I set out to write her a quick 300 word snippet of that, and then there was scene-setting and kidneys and I don’t even know. Here, Erin, have ~2400 words of hospital blither. ♥ Thanks to [](http://affabletoaster.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://affabletoaster.livejournal.com/)**affabletoaster** for a super-quick beta.

Dean wishes Sam would quit arguing already. All the talking means his fries are getting cold.

He waves the waitress over to refill his coffee. That at least is steaming hot, and Sam has the sense to shut up about their latest felony.

The minute she sashays away, though, Sam’s yammering on again. Dean doesn’t want to admit he’s got a point, because christ, how many classes had Sam managed to take at Stanford anyway, but somewhere among the art appreciation, American history, Spanish, and ballroom dancing, he’d apparently managed to get through first year anatomy. Which, Sam argues, makes him the logical choice for impersonating a doctor.

“Dude, I learned mine hands-on,” Dean says.

“Yeah, I get that you got the practical,” Sam says, “but one, animals and supernatural beings don’t have exactly the same anatomy as humans, and two, you can’t pull off being a doctor if you call it ‘that pink squishy bit.’”

“It is squishy.”

“Uh-huh. And it’s called the pancreas.”

Dean throws up his hands. “Fine, whatever. I’m not being a nurse.”

Sam shudders. “Yeah. No. I’m thinking you gotta be a technician of some kind. Just get a set of scrubs and push some equipment around.”

“Hey!” Dean brightens. “I could run the X-ray machine.”

“Do you know a single thing about running an X-ray machine?” Sam asks pointedly.

Dean shrugs. “How hard can it be?”

Sam just stares for a long minute, before launching into a tirade about radiation safety to which Dean pays no attention, particularly when the waitress bends over to get something out of the lowest rack of the dessert case.

Eventually they agree that Dean can probably fake being a respiratory technician for half a day – _“Pretend to listen to their lungs, then stick some plastic oxygen tubing in their nose,”_ – without killing anybody.

“Those tanks can explode,” Sam frets.

“No sweat,” Dean says. “It’s just a glorified air pig.”

Sam looks like he’s reconsidering the whole mission, but they’re out of leads and if they don’t get a look at this body, they haven’t got a thing to go on. Until another body turns up, of course, which is what they’re here to prevent, so.

 

 

Turns out that Sisters of Mercy Memorial Hospital has a color-coded system of scrubs. Only doctors and the operating room staff wear blue. The ER staff are in pale green, physio in navy.

Resp techs? Get bright Kelly green.

“Hey Sammy, wanna reconsider?” Dean smirks. “You’d make an awesome nurse.” In lavender.

Sam rolls his eyes and grabs a pair of shoe covers. “I’m gonna attend the first autopsy this morning, introduce myself. Come on down when they break for lunch. I’ll call you.”

He pulls on a white coat and strides out of the locker room, looking assured and confident and every inch the surgeon-who-thinks-they’re-God-Almighty.

Dean’s left behind dressed like a fucking leprechaun.

He clips on his fake ID, steals someone’s stethoscope, thinks about hiding in a locker all day, sighs, and heads out to a day of lying, evasion, and hauling highly flammable and explosive stuff around.

Sounds almost appealing, when he thinks about it like that.

 

 

“Excuse me.”

Dean’s managed to spend most of his morning pulling the same oxygen canister back and forth between the OR and the intensive care unit, avoiding getting sucked into anything.

“Hey there.”

He ignores the voice, striding purposefully along and trying to look like someone on their way to save a life. Which he should have down cold by now, except he doesn’t usually bother to notice how he looks as he does it.

“Excuse me. Hey!”

The voice is closer, annoyed. Dean grits his teeth and turns.

One of the ICU nurses, the tiny one with the short blonde braids, is standing there, arms folded under her breasts. She’s rocking the lavender scrubs, and Dean almost slides into charm-your-pants-off mode, remembering just in time she probably wants more than he can give.

“I need a trach change in bed 6.”

Like, say, that.

“We’ve been waiting since shift change,” she presses, “and you obviously haven’t got anything better to do.”

Her foot starts tapping impatiently as he opens and closes his mouth. “Actually, I gotta, uh – ”

His cell phone trills with a text.

He tries to look concerned instead of relieved as he pulls it out and glances at it. _Everyone at lunch. Basement level. We don’t have long._

“Ah, sorry,” he checks her nametag, “Caitlyn, I’m needed at a – ” he flounders for the word, fuck, he hasn’t watched anything but late-night porn in too long, what do they call it – “code. Gotta run!” He flashes her a quick, strained smile and takes off down the hall.

He hears a scuffle and looks back to see Caitlyn dive for the abandoned oxygen tank as it wobbles and tips over. He almost checks his stride, but she catches it before it hits the floor; he lunges through the stairwell door and is gone.

 

 

He gets into a real rhythm swinging down all nine flights of stairs to the basement – who the fuck puts the ICU on the ninth floor anyway? – takes the last half-flight in a single jump, throws open the door, and trips over Sam’s ginormous feet.

“In front of the door?” he says bitterly, ignoring Sam’s outstretched hand and hauling himself up the wall.

“Sorry,” Sam says, not meaning it, and Dean decides to strangle him as soon as his right elbow quits hurting. They’re in a morgue, after all. Lots of places to hide a body.

“They were ahead of schedule this morning,” Sam says, pushing off down the hall, “so we already started. He’s laid out in room 2.”

Dean grabs a face mask and goggles as they enter the room. He’d just as soon not get blood in his eyes. Again. Sam’s the messy sort.

The body on the steel trolley has been opened, jagged Y carved in the chest and abdomen. The room is cold; there’s ice in the sink, several white containers nestled in it. Most of the organs have already been removed to plastic tubs on the counter, their weights recorded on the whiteboard that hangs on the far wall. The smell of formalin from the containers Sam’s opening is nearly overpowering, but it beats the smells coming from the body itself. Man’d been dead a couple of days before the police broke down the door to find he’d apparently been suffocated while meditating or doing yoga or some shit, with no signs of forced entry, no prints, no tracks, no murder weapon, nothing but…

“Air,” Sam says. He tosses a brownish lump to Dean, who catches it reflexively, and curses, because he’s got a mask but hadn’t bothered to put gloves on because it was supposed to be Sam up to his elbows in dead guy, not him.

It’s kind of crinkly and goes pop. Like Rice Krispies. Dean squishes it experimentally because he’s already holding it, things can’t get much grosser, and it is admittedly kind of cool. Deer bits never did this.

“Kidneys shouldn’t crackle like that,” Sam says. “There’s air bubbles all through several of the major organs. Dr. Jenkins didn’t know what to make of it.”

“Air,” Dean echoes, hefting the kidney absent-mindedly. Something’s nagging at the edges of memory; he’s mentally flipping through Dad’s journal and listening to snatches of long-faded conversations. “Dude suffocated. Not enough air.”

“Or maybe too much? Choked him with it.” Sam’s looking thoughtful too. Dean chucks the kidney back at him, just for laughs. It’s a close call, but Sam gets it before it splats and gives him a bitchy look. Dean snorts; Sammy’s so fucking predictable.

“Air elemental,” Sam says. “Do you think – was he summoning it? Or was it sent after him?”

Dean walks over to the body, scanning for marks, runes, tattoos, scratches, hell, anything. “Help me turn him,” he says, and Sam reaches across with his gloved hands, rolls the guy towards him so Dean can continue inspecting his back.

He finds the tiny brand at the nape of the neck, just hidden at the hairline.

“So, he’d been using it.” Sam frowns, rolling the body back. “Guess it got away from him. You think it’ll have taken off after killing him? Or do we still have a pissed-off elemental floating around?” He turns away from Dean, snapping off his gloves and pitching them in the yellow biohazard bin.

Dean scowls at his slimy hands. “Dunno. They’re unpredictable sons of bitches.” He leans across the table and wipes his fingers down Sam’s back.

“What the – ” Sam spins, craning his neck over his shoulder, glaring at Dean and spluttering in outrage.

Dean just snorts with laughter and waggles his hands at Sam.

“Fuck, you – ” Sam looks ready to throw something at Dean but fortunately there’s nothing inorganic within reach and Sam’s gloveless. He settles for kicking the dissecting trolley hard. It rolls at Dean; Dean jumps back and takes off, still laughing.

Sam grabs a handful of ice from the sink and chases him down the hall, catching up to him just short of the stairwell. He pushes Dean up against the wall and snakes a hand behind Dean’s head, tipping ice down his back. Dean grunts and shoves hard on Sam’s chest. When that has no effect, he brings his still-sticky hands up and starts wiping them through Sam’s hair.

“Eww! Dude, gross!” Sam yelps, slamming a shoulder into Dean and jerking his head back. His free hand comes up to grab Dean’s wrist and pull it back against the wall. Dean’s still got his left hand tangled in Sam’s hair and they’re both half-glaring, half-laughing, breathing hard, when the stairwell door opens. Violently.

“Uh,” says Dean intelligently. “Caitlyn. Hi. I had to get a… thing. For the… oxygen. Thing.”

“What the hell are you playing at?” she says indignantly. “I was watching you, you haven’t done a bit of real work this morning, you didn’t do my trach change and then you just take off and drop…”

She trails off as she takes in the scene: Sam holding Dean up against the wall, Dean’s hand in Sam’s hair. Sam’s scrubs may have bits of dead dude’s kidney smeared on them, but they’re still blue. “I, uh, sorry, Doctor …?”

Sam turns to look at her. And Sam’s – he’s blushing, for fuck’s sake, and ducking his head and doing that shit where he looks out through his hair like a giant _puppy_ and women fall over themselves to pet him.

“Hey, ah – Caitlyn. I’m real sorry if you were inconvenienced.” Sam’s really laying on the charm, voice low and lazy. “Jack here’ll be back with you as soon as he’s done his … lunch break. But I’d take it as a personal favor if you didn’t mention that I … needed him for something.”

Caitlyn’s eyes go wide.

Dean’s do too.

He opens his mouth to protest the implications and Sam leans in harder, elbowing him in the ribs. Godammit. Dean sucks in a pained breath to demand what the hell, but freezes as Sam winks at Caitlyn and lowers his mouth to Dean’s.

Sam’s kissing him.

His brain is stuck.

Sam is kissing him. At first it’s just a press of lips, warm and harsh, and Dean hears a little indrawn breath behind them, and then the hand at the back of his neck squeezes and tips his chin up. Sam’s angling his head and licking into Dean’s mouth and god. Sam is _kissing_ him.

And _fuck,_ did Sam take classes in this too? Because he’s really fucking good at it. Dean thinks about that for a moment, thinks of Sam practicing, kissing all those co-eds, and he involuntarily growls low and deep. Sam jerks at that, like he’s been electrocuted, and surges up harder against Dean, letting go of his wrist. Huge hands cradle Dean’s skull and pull him in as the kiss gets harder, messier, all teeth and tongue and struggle.

Dean knows _he’s_ an awesome kisser, never had any complaints, which is maybe why Sam’s making little whimpering noises and rocking his hips into Dean’s, and holy shit, Sam’s hard.

Also, fucking _huge._

Dean gasps and shoves Sam back with a hand on his chest, suddenly aware that he’s achingly hard himself, which, okay, some pretty great kissing, whatever, it’s natural, but he’s hard and thinking about _Sam’s dick_ , and that is totally _unnatural_ and just … beyond fucked up.

He can’t see anyone in the hall now, but Sam’s giant shoulders are in the way. He shoves at Sam again, pushes round him; Caitlyn is gone.

“Okay,” Sam says, “we better get out of here.” He runs his fingers through his hair and grimaces. “God, you’re gross. I need a shower.”

“You kissed me,” Dean says.

“Uh, yeah, I know.” Sam looks … less freaked that Dean would like. Or expect. “Did you want her asking what we were really doing down here?” He pulls his lab coat together in the front. Dean watches his long fingers slide the buttons through the holes. “Pretty sure Dad had something about elementals in his journal, maybe there’s signs or stuff we can detect if it’s still in the vicinity.”

Dean usually doesn’t argue with results, but … “Dude. You _kissed_ me.”

“And? It worked. She bought it.” Sam looks at Dean, brow furrowed. “Let’s _go._ ”

It’s got to be that simple. Because anything else is unthinkable.

“I don’t have a lab coat,” Dean says. It just slips out. He is – fuck, he is _not_ going to blush. Even when Sam looks him up and down and figures out what he’s saying.

Scrubs don’t hide much.

Sam fucking _smirks_ at him and turns away. Dean remembers the whole strangling plan, a little too late as Sam’s already half-way up the stairs.

He chases up after him. They’ll get their clothes, they’ll get out. It’ll be fine.

Only two flights of stairs, but Dean can barely breathe. It’s not the exertion. It’s too much air. Too much Sam.

Sam has always been an elemental force in Dean’s universe.


End file.
